Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1887-06-24
Cocaine. .... grs., go
Aqua destil OF. l
NJ. y. Y. T., n. D.

Sixty grains of cocaine! Madam l
asked, where did you get this prescrip-
tion" She mentioned the doctors name.
How long have you known DR.. -
Five or six years. We'll, Madam, L haven't
any such amount of cocaine In my store,
and | doubt if there Is any such quantity
in Chicago. If there is. however, YOU can
not buy it at wholesale for less than S60.'
The poor woman was dazed. | requested
her to ask the doctor who wrote the pre-
scripti0p to call on me the next time he
came to the city, but l have never seen
him. l hold that every physician should
be a trained druggist. Here is pre-
scription sent me by DR.. -, calling
for grain of strychnine. A dose of
strychnlne is one-sixtieth of q grain. [
saw at once that the doctor had made a
mistake and sent for him. He thought
he had ordered one-sixtieth of grain
until convinced ofhis error by glancing
at tho prescription He was q thankful
man. Sometimes, however, doctors are
not so grateful to druggists who discover
their errors. l once refused 10 pat up a
prescription, knowing it to be an overdose.
The next day the physician came in thun-
dering to know why I had declined to
honor his prescription. l told him he
had mistakenly ordered an overdose. He
became indignant. Hoping to convince
me that [ was wrong he said the prescrip-
ton had been taken to Mr.. W, another
druggist, that it had been put up and the
dose administered to the patient, produc-
ing the desired result. / asked him to &C
company me to the other drug store and
let me see the prescription. He consented
and after looking at the quantity of NOR
phine ne had ordered owned up IN a surly
way that was right"
Had the other druggist put up the
prescription as it was wrltten!"
mo he saw that it was an overdose an
took the liberty of correcting the mistake.
We have to be continually on the lookout
for overdoses. The doctor who made
this error has never been near my store
since"
HAS the drug business undergone any
radical change during the past fifteen or
twenty years?'
eyes many lines of goods which we
handled almost exclusively then we scarce
ly touch now. There was q period when
carriage and liverymen came to
the druggist for their lubricating oils, but
all that trade is now lost to Us. [ remem-
Der when our business in chamOis' skins
was quite feature; that has about dis
appeared. Formerly we had almost a mon
Opoly on tooth brushes, and got from 80
to 70 cents each for them. Nov we rare
ly sell tooth brush. They are to be
found in every dry goods store and retail
at from 10 to % cents. Years ago we had
almost monopoly on perfumes and toilet
soaps; now you get them at the dry goods
store. l have sold hundreds of ivory
brushes and cOmts for from So to IS; now
combs and brushes are made of celluloid,
and bring only about a quarter of what
the ivory articles did. | remember when
people purchased the bulk of their spices
at the druggists; that trade is wiped out.
Toilet powders, soaps and cosmetics are
nova part of the stock OF every dry goods
store, and in the loss of those articles and
Others | might name we have been de-
prived of SO per cent of our business.
We now have to wait on fully three times
the number of customers we used to in
order to take in the same amount of
money. | remember the time when we
thought nothing of selling two or three
pairs of toilet bottles in day at$5 or$ 10
a pair. Now these bottles are kept in the
dry goods stores and they retail for from
81 to So per pair"
"In what lines has your business in
creased?"
patent medicines mainly. We also get
increased custom growing out of the peo-
pies growing knowledge of the proper way
to treat themselves for thousand and
one little ailments. A lady dosen't feel
quite right, remembers that when she
felt the same way before and called,a doc
tor. He prescribed bromide, or iron and
bark, or quinine, ard so she sends to the
druggist for what she had before"
what drug is most called for?'
"Quinine. 1 once had prescription
calling for quinine when morphine was
intended. No l didn't put it up, and saw
ed a life thereby. Speaking of morphine,
1 must tell you something funny on my
self. In the middle of this. block is a
German banker-as kindhearted man
as ever lived. One night he came to me
in great distress of mind, telling me that
his horse was dying; he was positive that
the animal was dying, he couldn't bear TO
see the beast suffer, and asked me TO mix
up dose TO make the horse die easy. 1
put up forty grains of morphine and told
the banke: to be sure and get it all down
the animal. Early the next morning in
came my German neighbor, all smiles:
the horse, he said, was alive and doing
well.
Did you give him the morphine"
''Oh, va, certainly, sure"
''All of it,"
ooh, va, sure, certainly. Unit / stay oop
nit him all night. Unit pooty 5000 dot
morphine took dose pains away unit he feel
goot unit eat hay all de time now for more